How to Make the Most of Your Time at the Airport

In addition to being long drives that usually take you out of the city, airport rides can be plain boring. All that waiting in line, waiting for your passenger to find you – it’s enough to make some drivers swear off airport rides. Not so with Dean! Today, guest post contributor Dean Lee shares his strategies on making the most out of airport rides. Got a great guest post idea? Click here to contact me.

You know the experience. Pick up a ride request early in the morning or early evening and head to the airport. After you drop off your ride, you decide to jump in line at the designated holding area to wait for arrivals.

Or perhaps you just start your day or evening at the airport waiting for a request. Yep, it’s great. Simple, right? Get in line and wait for that ping. And wait… and wait… and wait.

Airports can be a great source of rides that generally pay out better than other rides. That said, does it make sense to wait one, two or three hours for the next ride request? What are you missing out on driving elsewhere during this time? Is this the most effective use of your time? In some cities, Uber is bypassing the line in favor of pre-match and re-match.

However, when you are riding the airport wave, it pays to be smart about using airports by doing some simple homework. Know your market, understand traveler habits, and ride the waves of opportunity.

Before we get to the how, let’s look at the basics.

Your Market

First, ask some basic questions about your city and its market. What months do you have the most travelers passing through your port? Are there seasonal peaks and valleys? What airlines dominate your market? Is it Alaska, United, Delta or others? Does your city have a port that services international flights? Is your city a major international hub like San Francisco or Seattle or simply a starting point for points beyond?

Sound like a lot of questions? Well, guess what? You don’t have to be a travel expert to find this information. It’s readily available. Every major port provides stats on flights. It’s a search on Google to find your market’s data. For example, the Port of Portland here in the Pacific NW.

Look for trends and take a high level view. You don’t have to be a data analyst to see volume trends for domestic and international flights. You may discover that June through August, for example, you need to make sure you are available to work in airport runs as part of your airport strategy.

Travelers’ Habits

Begin asking questions. Are you familiar with your state or cities travel guides? Do you have one or two guides in your car? If not, why not? Is your destination the door to a vacation wonderland? Do folks fly into your city for the weekend just to hang out? Knowing the fun, popular spots in your city will not only make you well-informed for navigation purposes, but may also net you some tips.

From a business perspective, do you have several major corporations in your city such as Intel, Nike or others? If so, what does that mean for business travel? What months are you more likely to see business travel? How do holidays impact business travel?

Another question to reflect is, what have you learned from travelers in the past? What questions have they asked? You would be surprised what you can glean in simple conversations such as ‘tell me what is your profession, what do you do?’ or ‘Are you visiting for business or pleasure?’

Time to Get Granular

While knowing your airport’s monthly – yearly stats is helpful to get a view of the flow of travelers, you really need daily flight schedule to begin to understand what I call waves of opportunity. I use this site from Port of Portland (PDX) to know the flight schedule for the day.

I keep my search specific to arrivals, and then determine when I will visit the airport. You can also drill down on the where the flight originated from. Before we get into this detail, let’s take a quick look at the driver hold queue experience.

Have you noticed how the TNC wait queue works? You arrive and you are assigned a place in line. Let’s say you come into the queue and your Lyft app greets you with “There are 54 drivers in front of you”. Okay, you sit back, time to wait.

[Editor’s note: This may be different with recent airport changes. Click here to read if your airport is testing pre-match and re-match]

You notice in the span of 15 minutes, the queue went from 54 to 37. Wow, this is great! The next 15 minutes you see 7 more drivers have left. Awesome, should be no time before I get a request, right? Now over the next 45 minutes, requests trickle to a crawl. Three, two… one. Another 30 minutes or more go by and finally, you are next in line.

What just happened? The ride requests seem totally random! It’s not random. You just experienced a wave – a crest to trough in demand. From the data points I’ve taken over several months, there is a direct correlation between flight schedules versus number of ride requests. This is where knowing your market comes in.

If there is anything I’ve learned serving PDX, certain flights generate the most requests. I’ve used my previous business travel experience to know what flights are most likely to have a number of business travelers. Now, string several flights together in a 15 minute span and you have a wave.

Wave Example

I’m an early morning driver. I typically consider waiting at the airport after I’ve dropped off a departure depending on time of day, opportunity or if I need a break.

I wanted to check on a batch of late morning/early afternoon flights this particular day. I knew if I could get to the airport before 11 a.m., I had a chance to pick up a ride within 1 hour. I entered into the queue at 10:50AM. I was the 57th driver in the queue.

I got a ride request at 12:19 p.m. This is how the wait time tallied:

I came into the queue when a series of flights from LA, San Jose and Oakland were arriving or on the ground. I was aware, based on the schedule, that there were other flights arriving that presented another good opportunity to connect with a ride. There were also flights from smaller cities/markets but my consistent observation is certain flights generate more ride potential than others. If you miss a window, your wait time can easily extend to 2 or more hours.

Takeaway

If you are trying to make the most of your drive time, be aware of the waves based on the flight schedule for the day. Make your decision to stick around on current hold time and the opportunity presented by flight schedule. Also note to drill down on the schedule detail day of the flight, to see if the flight is on time or changed. Flights get canceled or delayed, which can change your decision.

Also consider your experience. If you know you can pick up 2-3 rides in the morning driving versus waiting for 2-3 hours at the airport, it’s an easy decision to walk away. Know when to hold and when to fold and walk away.

Finally, life happens. You miss a wave, you are low in the queue. You’ve invested 2 hours waiting for a ride. Now you have to decide if you are going to stick it out or if you can walk away. I’m human, I’ve experienced this both ways. I know what it means to wait for 3 hours to get a ride that paid out less than $15.

In that case, my ride was less than 3 miles away! I chose my attitude to serve the customer by allowing them to run into Staples before they made their meeting with a client at Starbucks around the corner. (I was rewarded with a $6 tip on my fare). Not great but felt good.

Dean Lee lives and plays in the Pacific NW, serving Portland and surrounding area as a Lyft driver. Dean works part-time the technical manager for a non-profit serving the domestic violence community (www.armsonline.org). He enjoys driving in the mornings serving customers who need a ride to their office or the airport. Dean loves the conversations and connections he has made as a rideshare driver.

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Drivers, what do you think of these driving strategies for the airport, and do you have any airport strategies to share?

I'm Harry, the owner and founder of The Rideshare Guy Blog and Podcast. I used to be a full-time engineer but now I'm a rideshare blogger! I write about my experience driving for Uber, Lyft, and other services and my goal is to help drivers earn more money by working smarter, not harder.

I have sat at SFO, OAK and SJC and (other than both OAK and SJO when I’m finishing my day and am in destination mode) have found it hasn’t been worth the wait. (For some reason, Uber won’t let you use destination mode at the airports – but in every way, their destination mode is terrible. Maybe someone could explain why Uber’s destination mode is not driver friendly…see below.)

I used to wait at SFO when there were fewer than 60-70 drivers ahead of me, but now every time I check the number of drivers waiting, there are always well over 100. You can easily end up waiting over 2 hours for a passenger. (Using the Lyft app at SFO, for some reason I kept getting kicked out after 15-20 minutes and I would lose my place in queue – another reason I stopped waiting. I wrote Lyft customer service twice and they basically told me it was my problem. I have never been kicked out of the Uber queue at the SFO.)

At Oakland and SJC, waits are long because there are fewer flights coming in. I think that Dean’s recommendation about looking at the incoming flights is sage advice. If the business flights aren’t coming in (flights from LAX, East Coast or overseas), it makes sense to move on and look for passengers elsewhere.

I do absolutely love Uber’s match/pre-match as long as I’m not going home any time soon. Lately, it has been the only time I pick up passengers at the airport.

I’m going to use this platform to bitch a little now:
My complaints about Uber’s destination mode:
1) 2 opportunities with Uber vs. 3 with Lyft. I’d be okay with 2, but I get kicked out all of the time. See 3.
2) Not being able to turn it off and turn it back on without losing one of the two opportunities. Lyft allows us to turn off the destination mode then turn it back on.
2) Getting kicked out of the destination mode after approving that I stay online. Before I get kicked out, I first receive a text asking if I want to stay online, then I click the “Stay Online” button in the text. The app then pops back up. When the app pops up, it shows I am online…then – a few seconds later – I get kicked off. It happens every time.
If I have already given someone a ride in destination mode and I get kicked offline, I just lost one of the two I am given each day.
To paraphrase Nancy Kerrigan “Why…why…why…does Uber do this to me?”

Leo-PA

Hi, I actually called Uber support in Philly asking if I can have a destination mode set and use it in airport to hopefully get a ride towards my home. They said it does not work like that, so can’t get there from here.
As far as destination mode you can just leave it on while scooping up a ride from a competing platform, just ignore the ride request while it comes in while you drive on a competing platform then you will not lose your destination opportunity at least in theory.
I use flight stats app to see WHEN the flights land and if they are on time especially in smaller airports then you can ask your passenger “how was Detroit, etc, or you guys got delayed 2 hours flying out;)” creates a more personal touch. Lastly when I pickup passsengers with luggage I always place a sticky note on the dash to serve as a reminder I have their bags in my trunk. I once almost pulled away with someone’s luggage and now use sticky notes;)

Leo-PA

One other comment on Lyft destination filter which most of the time ends up finding me 0 rides. If I am on a long drive, say 70 miles away for pyersonal reasons I would turn on destination filters of both platforms. Lyft after a while just disconnect you with an all too familiar message which ends with “destination mode” I would re set it only to get disconnected after some time with no rides found, and cycle repeats 5 more. At which point Lyft sends you a celebratory text something along the lines “great job, you used destination filter 6 times today, come back tomorrow (and we again will not find you any passengers)” not to mention that out of those 6 times Lyft found 0 rides 😉
I would prefer Uber to increase destination mode to more than just 2 times a day

Matt Wernecke

My last 5 drop off’s at Hartsfield Jackson, put me in Que at 107 to 169 cars in front of me!
Any time of day.
Fuck Uber!
Fuck part time drivers!

Leo-PA

Matt, aren’t you a part time driver yourself?

At least disguise your name before posting idiotic comments on line in the future.

Majority of people reading this blog are part time drivers like me and somehow have enough -brains- to make a few extra bucks, you on the other hand appear to not be so fortunate

腾鸾乐园

Yeah this is totally a good advice, I have been waiting for 2 hours on Tuesday August 02/2017 and I got no passenger, and you have to be aware of the Lyft app because I get kicked out of the queue for no reason, this kind of rideshare or alternative taxi service is only passenger friendly and company friendly, drivers are cheap employees, and one thing is, do we have to get a business license for this? Hella no, it’s not worth it, most passengers are really a pain in the axss and they act like they are the king of England and never leave a tip, come on if you travel less than one mile I only get 3.5 dollars and that fare is not even enough for gas. This is a profitless business.

SNA is a bit of an anomaly. 90 % of my pax during the week are business folks who are attending a business within 5 miles of the airport. So, it’s usually not worth it to wait around. I use airport time to stop at the local starbucks and get some breakfast. The cue is comparatively low, averaging 30-40. So, wait times are usually a half hour or so. But, as I said, most trips are minimum fare.

I don’t know how it works around other airports but if you are in the cue at SNA, you may still pick up an ordinary ride from the surrounding area. So, you’re not locked into the cue.

Dean Lee

Follow up notes from Dean. Be sure to check out the article Curtis wrote, referenced above.
Lyft confirmed the feature pre-match/ re-match is in full swing at PDX.

I’ve experienced re-match several times after writing this article, typically get two or three a week. It’s a great feature in my opinion though it impacts the TNC queue wait time. That said but when traveler volume is high you can still depend on the fundamentals presented (your market may differ).

About

I'm Harry, the owner and founder of The Rideshare Guy Blog and Podcast. I used to be a full-time engineer but now I'm a rideshare blogger! I write about my experience driving for Uber, Lyft, and other services and my goal is to help drivers earn more money by working smarter, not harder. Read More…

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